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Went to a party last night with Lani Mercado. Yes, Lani Mercado. don’t ask.
I forgot to ask who the caterer was, but the food was okay.
I loved the brazo de mercedes, but instead of custard they put halaya (ube), i loved it. As in!!! 🙂

weeee! I miss cooking and baking. like totally! 😦

Also went to Zenses, I didn’t make it to the nitro-coffee demo, but I made it to the ice cream. It’s my 3rd time eating bacon and egg ice cream. Doesn’t get old. 🙂

I should try the nitro coffee and write about that. Soon!! weeee!

Love is in the air.
My luck is on the pits, but it’s coming back, fighting to give me the good luck I know I need and deserve. A few more weekS! yehba!

A bunch of us went to Embassy to celebrate a friends forray to “independence” yesterday, July 4 (yes, I know, how appropos right?)—the friend being Mia, and the bunch being Kwe, Kassy and moi.

We got there, and started the night with a free tequila shot, WOW. And proceeded to finish off two bottles of Red Wine. The wines were really nothing super special, but they did taste good and they did the trick.

The “trick” being making us piss drunk as sailors in a port after 2 years (well in Kwe’s case.. 1 1/2 years) of no alcohol. Hahaha! The last time I was that drunk was last year—–my birthday (insert creepy flashbacks).

I wasn’t drunk that I couldn’t remember. I was just drunk enough to just laugh my heart out at every little thing, walk tipsy and say the most inane stuff, but I could still remember, which is good. Let’s just say, thank God, nobody was hurt or eherm.. molested.

Ohhhkay…

So we come back to wine. I remember screw-cap (which means less quality wine) and brands/winemakers like Penfolds and something something. I wanted red wine from Wolf Blass actually, but I think Kassy picked another. We had if I remember a Shiraz and a Cabernet Sauvignon, or maybe neither. I only remember some things clearly, haha! Like someone saying “what?” “what?” and a guy saying “are you with maya? and kwe going “what’s your name??”. HAHA!

To say it was a fun night, is a HUGE understatement.

But really the point of this entry is that wine makes me feel old, because I’ve always equated wine to being old.

Yesterday after a really big comfort food happy lunch in Rufo’s in Makati and dessert in Fluke in A.Venue Mall. I found myself enroute to the south for work, then lo and behold! there was an invitation to go to a singaporean food thing with Kassy, Kwe, by her friend JR… and possibly Tamille and Chi (both of which I have not seen in ages btw)

I was really tired having only slept about 2 hours the night before, but Kassy said.. “I’ll pay for your food” Haha, as much as it pains me to say this, I cannot say no to Free Food and Singapore in the same sentence, so off we went.

So we went to Manila Ocean Park and we found ourselves in a really picturesque (think Traditional Asian interspersed with Modern elements) restaurant named Makansutra.

Makansutra is a south east asian restaurant that wants to give us foodies in Manila their unique take on hawker food ala Singapore. (You know the place in sing, where it’s like an open air thingie wherein you point at what you want and they cook it for you? Think Ihaw-ihaw but Satay instead of Adidas..har har!)

They gave us a tasting of 13 of their 14 dishes (haha, we’re due for another course next time we’re there). We were a table of 6 hungry people gorging on stuff we couldn’t pronounce, haha! that’s the long and short of it.

How did the food fare? Some were notable hits including that yummy omellete thing with the really tender fish, suprisingly loved the simple inihaw na bangus, and that egg noodle dish reminiscent of pad thai without the tamarind and much sweetness.

Drinks were on the guests, and we got different drinks each. I was lucky enough to have ordered a Lemon Barley Drink, which I loved and seriously will duplicate soon. How did my drink taste? Think rice “am” with floating bits of barley with lemon. I know it sounds weird, but the Barley was yummy I tell you! The rest had this rose drink (colored pink, tastes like something with rose water with a slight raspberry like tinge at the end, yes, think cough syrup but it was suprisingly a hit with the people who ordered it) and a michael jackson drink. (MJ = soymilk + gulaman, needed Syrup, but what the hey! healthy fiber and milk).

Dessert was a foreign version of halo-halo (to tell you the truth, I kinda like Razon’s way better) and a barley based dessert. Between the two, we liked the latter. It was barley water again with barley of course (duh!) syrup, longgans and a jelly-ish/gulaman thing with a unique texture.

Another highlight of the night besides the food was the raffle of which every member of our table won something including the grand prize worth 6,000 bucks. Har har! We were called the Lucky Table of the night for obvious reasons. har har!

Considering that I was invited last minute, I didn’t pay for anything (thanks Kas and JR!) , immensely enjoyed our table banter, and tried new eats that although I can’t pronounce do remember the taste of, last night was indeed lucky–it’s one of those–thank God I said yes nights which I am blessed to have ever so often.

Now if I only knew the names of the food and we could have taken pictures, this entry would have been better. 🙂 (Note to Makansutra: when giving a tasting, give the guests a copy of the menu. It would help us way much! 🙂 )

Makansutra’s formally opens on July 4 in the Manila Ocean Park. If you want a unique experience with a wonderful view of Manila bay (date place anyone?) go do give them a visit!

And no, you don’t have to pay the Manila Ocean Park entrance fee to get in. Btw, I was suprised there’s a mall inside MOP already! 🙂

Last night, I got my first big naysayer, and the naysayer was quite close to me. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m making decisions on my own and going at something on my own, or maybe it’s something else entirely.

It’s being called stupid when you know you’ve got a plan. It started to drive me up the wall, then I just said, what the hey! Bring it on!

Haha, I still get these weird temper things and then I’m good and back at happy. People might think I’m going crazy, eherm, nah, I just got quick decision skills.

Cart department? I trained today with our worker and it seems good. But there’s still a lot of things to think about and plan, but I’ll really know when I finally get the thing set-up.

Tomorrow is going to the location day to finalize things. I’m going with Kwe and Kassy.

And universe, Sander is going home to help me. And we will get awesome.

I recently attended a food tasting/launching in Zenses, neo-chinese cuisine place in the A.Venue Mall c/o Playboy Magazine. Initial impression of the sampling wasn’t very impressive, but I got what they were going for, which was a new twist to Chinese Classics. Suffice it to say, I was not super impressed, but what I was–was intrigued with a drink they made with Liquid Nitrogen, you heard it folks, LIQUID NITROGEN. So, I thought that maybe this place was awesome for drinks, but a friend of mine, showing great “bullshitting” abilities, got us free food not with the sample that they were giving–what food? POPCORN.

And that popcorn blew my food-loving mind.

For one thing, that popcorn was billowing out smoke like it was cooking from a witch’s cauldron! And when you put the popcorn in your mouth? The first bite spews out billows of cool smoke. That in itself was amazing!
The popcorn itself was sweet, salty and had this unique flavor that right now I can’t really tell you, but maybe with another bowl of that, I prolly could.(haha) I tell you, that was phenomenal for me as I’ve read about this, and only have seen this in television. (Heston Blumenthal anyone?)

That single moment in itself made Zenses, one of the restaurants I WILL try and eat again in properly, so I did.

Last Sunday, for lunch I took my family for Mother’s Day lunch in Zenses. We ordered : Not So Chicken Lollipop, and Beef Something (I forgot), Chicken and Salted Fish Fried Rice, Polunchai dimsum, and the Nitrogen Made Ice Cream. Yes, you read right— Nitrogen made Ice Cream.

The Chicken Lollipop was suprising. It was chicken loaded with other meat and goodies, served with a sweet-sour sauce, and a plum sauce. My brother, who’s the chicken-guy in the family gave it a thumbs up. The Beef dish was good served with crispy onion rings, a somewhat-typical chinese beef dish (think beef and brocolli, although less of an oyster sauce taste, a lot deeper, like it was made from almost demi-glace, in other words it’s like a beef stew, but with the barest hint of oriental) with peas. The Chicken and Salted Fish Fried Rice was good, my mother said, she could that eat that on its own.The Polunchai dimsum was not our choice, we ordered an Oyster Pancake but we were told the oysters were not up to par, and could not be served to us, and we were given a freebie instead.

Can I just take this moment to commend that restaurant for doing that. As you well know, Oyster Pancake will and can very well hide some if not, a lot of oyster imperfections, or even hints of it not being uber fresh. (Flashback to remembering an oyster pancake from a well-known chinese food joint. I shudder!) So we got the Polunchai, I’ve had this type of dimsum before, but it was way better than any I tasted, maybe because it was 1) free and 2)steamed fresh and not in those food carts that just go around and you pick? Hmm, it was good enough that we got another order of it that we paid for. har har!

Now comes the exciting part, table-side service. Any one knows that table side service is the bomb for foodies, but making ice cream!!? I thought i’d have to go to the states to get this, so I knew that I personally was in for a treat. We were given a slew of flavors to choose from— from baileys, to lavender, to rose, and that Hongkong flower.

We picked BACON AND EGG. I think it was the chef himself that served us (must get his name next time). I loved the interaction, and I honestly wanted to jump up and down and beg him to let me try it! (PS. I’ll prolly do that next time!). So after the smoke cleared, we saw semi-solid ice cream. We were given martini glasses, in which liquid nitrogen was poured (it really does bubble btw) and then our ice cream was placed in the cooled glasses, and we got to enjoy it.

I personally couldn’t taste the bacon, but I did saw bacon bits, but the egg was very present, and for a dessert, it was good, and I liked it. But I am excited to go back and try out the other flavors.

Total damage was only P1650 : ice cream, a rice dish, 2 main courses/entrees, a dimsum dish for 4 people who were very psyched to have eaten there, and will return for more.

So foodies, let’s go eat there?!!! I think we’ll have a great time asking/harrasing the persons to let us try making our own table-side ice cream! har har!

PS. The table beside us were calling their friends and telling them about it, and video-taping it, which I should have done too! haha!

So how was your holy week?
Mine has been pretty normal and steady, and such is the way of spending vacation at home.
Also, being given the chance to be at home, with our cook having her vacation, I found myself with chances to flex mi culinary muscles during this lenten season.
I cooked mainly two things: Chicken Ala King with Homemade Biscuits and Corned Beef Spaghetti with Chicken fingers

Let’s just say, both were deemed eatable by the public, even the biscuits, which I am surprised I managed not to make as hard as hockey pucks. Seriously, I haven’t messed with dough in a while.

So far, the cake business has been picking up and as of today, there are outstanding orders for my chocolates, so I think all good. I should really start doing some fondant, as this is the key business growth, but I’m caught up in the other business side (the resort), it’s summer and things are picking up at that end. All is good.

I really really want to flex my culinary muscles and I need the practice, I’m | | close to peddling my services as a teacher, but I can’t right now, too many stuff to do, although I am getting my teaching fix teaching Jap workers/businessfolk english, but that’s another raket all together.

I hope everyone had a blessed easter, we’re eating somewhere tonight, and I hope there are some pictures!

moi

My name is Joko. The age is late 20s, a culinary school graduate, i trained in pastry in one of the 5 star hotels in the Philippines, I manage a resort, and do some sort of catering on the side. I co-own a desserts business that sells in a store in Trinoma. I belong to an awesome food group, and I like to eat out a lot, usually at the same places, but I'm now trying to be more "adventurous".

I would probably be the laziest food blogger you can find, and I will most probably update most of this blog from the trusty phone.

If it doesn't look good in my camera phone, it might not be good. So don't kill me if the photos are bleh. We will work on getting our sh*t together and buy a camera. Patience is a virtue, and i know, time is gold. :)

So drop me a line, tell me what you think, or tell me if you have any brilliant suggestions on what and where I can eat or get a decent meal.

On a side note: I seriously wanted to drop the Chef part in the whole "undercover chef" but i've decided, I will stick to it until it galls me enough that I will cook something and sell it to the masses, be famous and be on tv.